


New Tales.

by Sententiae



Category: Static Shock
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-11-20
Updated: 2011-11-20
Packaged: 2017-10-26 07:55:20
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,239
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/280618
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sententiae/pseuds/Sententiae
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Anansi has to rewrite some of his tales to include a new character.</p>
            </blockquote>





	New Tales.

**Author's Note:**

  * For [fresne](https://archiveofourown.org/users/fresne/gifts).



> [I hope this turned out ok, I did a bit of research on Anansi and re-watched his episodes, but other than that it has been a very long time since I've seen the series! It was a last minute pinch hit, and I hope your original writer still manages to turn out something amazing for you eventually!]

Once in time there was Kwaku Anansi, the bravest of spiders. To become the owner of all stories, Kwaku Anansi embarked on a quest to capture three of the most dangerous animals in his kingdom: Tiger, Python, and Hornet. The three were a plague to their lands, destroying all those who dared enter and devouring them for themselves. Tiger, steely and strong, fell victim to his own overconfidence, believing that it was he tricking his ‘saviour’ into his death and not the other way around. Python, deceptive and vain, was woven into a defeat threaded with his own pride. Hornet, so divisive and splintered, lost to his own desire for comfort when threatened with a rain storm he could have otherwise weathered on his own.

Kwaku Anansi vanquished the beasts themselves, but he could not destroy fully their evil roots. And so, with every generation they re-emerge, shaped by the blackness that lives within the world they are born into.

Anansi too, is reborn. His powers have passed into an amulet that preserves his wisdom, trickery, and the allusions his stories are able to cast.

He is not, and has never been, related to Spider-Man.

The tales of Anansi, and the moralities and strength that hide in their words, come to a new Spider each time Tiger, Hornet, and Python re-emerge. It becomes his duty to not only destroy the evils once more, but to also build on Kwaku Anansi’s stories and to remind all that strength is found first in courage and wit. Each Anansi brings something unique to the stories. One brings hope, and how it is born in the smallest of buds. Another tells of youth, and the duality of folly and optimism.

The Anansi of this tale spins friendship, and how the greatest of evils are best faced with someone at your side.

Our Anansi finds his place deep in Ghana, fighting the many tigers, hornets, and pythons that have slipped into the souls of humans and sunk into their hearts. There are villains that wear the faces of humans, and heroes that are wild beasts, but it is in a country far across an expanse of blue that once ravaged Ghana's lands but now lays home to many of her sons, that Anansi battles his sacred enemies once more.

Anansi fights for another hero’s kingdom, one filled with hip hop and silver tongued quips, and with a boy who finds his strength in two earths. Static is a modern warrior, but he caries within him a heart and steel that is ancient.

Together they battle Python’s vanity first, in a vault that has been built to keep out those seeking the rare diamonds that lie there. Python seeks them as his new eyes, for they come from a sacred statue in Ethiopia and grant their owner the gift of divinity. Python is clever but overconfident, and while he whips Anansi into the wall with his tail and sinks venomous teeth into the friend of Static, his scales cannot withstand the static symmetrically of a perfectly aimed blast of energy.

Python falls, but his failure is not their victory. Their victory instead lies in the way that Static allows the diamonds to fall deep into the ruins, returning them to the earth as the vault crumbles into a cavern far below the city. In the place of these powerful, priceless gems, he chooses to save something far more precious.

They only just get Static’s friend to the hospital in time, for the venom has leeched into his blood and started to corrupt his very life force. Even a minute - a second - delay would have cost the boy his life, and yet Static never once considers the diamonds first.

Anansi learns how it is not who you defeat that matters, but who you save.

Hornet’s duplicity comes next to the American city, and it seems that he has stolen a page from one of Anansi’s own tales as he uses the power of words to bend others to his will. The fractured hornets buzz lies and half-truths into people’s ears, turning them away from a righteous path with whispers of how that path has only ever betrayed them. Even Static’s own sister falls foul to their words, seeing only senselessness in her work and mind. It is her that the queen chooses as her vessel, and who they must fight if they are to have any hope of victory.

This time, Static becomes a story teller of his own. While Anansi sweetens his web with honey and draws many of the hornets back to him, Static speaks to the one who lingers within his sister. He tells of their childhood together, of his sister’s strength and warmth. He recalls the sadness, the friendships, the beauty that shines in her soul. He wins his sister back not with the power of his static force, but through the strength that lies within his own heart.

Anansi remembers then the strength of words, and how it is the people who speak them that gives them their true power. He also is unfortunate enough to learn that honey will get absolutely everywhere if given the chance.

Tiger returns to the city last, this time deliberately dragging Anansi down into his deep pit without ever first asking for help. The webs that have trapped Tiger in the past are now Anansi’s own cage, and it takes them all (Static and his friend, strange and new heroes that Anansi has never seen before, simple strangers who cannot stand by and let anyone fall victim to such a prey) to save Anansi and return the streets back to those who live there.

Anansi now knows that his own strengths can be used against him if he does not use them wisely.

***

“Woah, man. You wrote this about _us_?” Virgil asked, wide-eyed, as Anansi wrapped up his tale, his melodic words coming to a natural end.

“About you, young man,” Anansi corrected. “My story has been told for centuries, but yours has only just begun. It is imperative that it be woven into the fabric of our history for future generations.”

“But I’m not part of this story,” Virgil protests. “I mean, after you were here last I read some of Dad’s books. Your story is awesome, and I can see why it inspires so many people. Last time I checked though, you didn’t have a side kick who could make people’s hair stand on end.”

“How can the world ever change if the stories never do?” Anansi asked seriously, dark eyes fixed on the future. “It is these stories that must be told, so that they can be passed down to those who seek to fight their own tigers, hornets, and pythons. Not everyone is an Anansi, Virgil.” Anansi smiled with a quick flash of white teeth. “Some are a Static.”

“I think you just did my head in,” Virgil replied after a heavy pause. “That … that is going to take a while to process. But, thank you. It’s an honour.” The boy was going to write his own stories now, Anansi just knew. It was not their victories in this time that were truly important, but what others were then able to achieve on the backs of their success. “Just one thing.”

“Yes, Virgil?”

“Do you think you could slip in a reference somewhere to the fact I’m good looking, as well?”


End file.
